Wednesday, May 6, 2026
Ultimate Arch Gamer is Pretty Good
KDE Neon
KDE Neon
KDE neon uses the KDE Plasma desktop environment, specifically configured to showcase the latest, bleeding edge version of Plasma, along with up to date KDE applications and Qt frameworks. It is built on top of the latest Ubuntu LTS (Long Term Support) base.
Default desktop is Plasma 6.
Neon User Edition 6.6.4 was tested and is installed in my NUC. I did not realise until I installed Gnome on top of the KDE base, that it was Ubuntu based distributions. I shun all Ubuntu derivatives of Linux for many reasons. Just as good, I tested it inadvertently, to get the real feel of old Ubuntu. I had to install Gnome 3 times to get all its components, ready. Ubuntu Noble/Universe was the repository. It was badly maintained and it took a very long time to download and inappropriately long time to boot up.
It had multiple desktop iterations, going up to 14 in both X-11, Classic and Wayland iterations.
I painfully, tested all of them and all were bad except the two Plasma (X-11 and Wayland) versions. Gnome versions were ugly and the icons were huge without any distinguishing features. What was noteworthy was customer analysis icon was blurred, perhaps fearing adverse comments and almost invisible. When, I clicked it I got a huge panel which looked liked a statistical package which I would not bother feed in information. On Gnome version when one click with the mouse only one would be able to see the panels and dialogue boxes which was irritating to say the least. I have Gnome Classic Desktop in my Debian installation and it gives the lovely old nostalgia, stereotype but legible.
This is the first time, I had a fell of the Wayland compositor Saga in real life situation. I am a guy who is not interested in frills and fringes on the Gnome desktop but standard look and above all functionality. Only bright panel icons in various colours which I can spread around the desktop as I wish them to be in order of access priority without interfering with my work activities.
Since, it had multiple iterations of X-11, Wayland and Gnome Classic, I could for the first time see the real desktop effects of the compositor.
They were non productive and to say the least irritating distractions to my work flow.
I was a well organised guy as a medical man both in Ceylon and abroad which was an asset. Working with completely unknown characters is the order of the day in hospitals.
User Edition is the recommended edition for everyday users who want the latest, stable KDE software immediately upon release. While the KDE is "rolling release", the underlying OS base is Ubuntu LTS. Unlike other distributions, KDE neon delivers the KDE Plasma desktop exactly as the KDE developers intended, with no patches or changes to default settings. It offers customisation while being feature rich.
Unfortunately, with the older image, installing desktop environments other than Plasma is not supported. It uses Discover when installing applications via Snap or Flatpak.